


Light That You Shine

by Rubynye



Category: Star Trek XI
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-10
Updated: 2010-01-10
Packaged: 2017-10-06 02:46:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/48853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubynye/pseuds/Rubynye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gaila and Jim under the infinite sky. Inspired by the prompt "<a href="http://community.livejournal.com/st_xi_kink/4765.html?thread=13858205#t13858205">Gaila/Kirk - unfinished business.</a>"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Light That You Shine

Title: Light That You Shine  
Fandom: Star Trek XI  
Rating: NC-17  
Pairing: Gaila/Jim; Jim/others (including Jim/Bones, Jim/Carol Marcus and Jim/Gary Mitchell) and Gaila/others referred to.  
Summary: Gaila and Jim under the infinite sky. Inspired by the prompt "[Gaila/Kirk - unfinished business.](http://community.livejournal.com/st_xi_kink/4765.html?thread=13858205#t13858205)"  
Content Advisory: Character deaths discussed, slash and nonmonogamy alluded to, het practiced.  
Acknowledgements: To [](http://lomedet.livejournal.com/profile)[**lomedet**](http://lomedet.livejournal.com/), for [](http://ninhursag.livejournal.com/profile)[**ninhursag**](http://ninhursag.livejournal.com/), and [inspired by](http://florahart.dreamwidth.org/948727.html) [](http://florahart.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://florahart.livejournal.com/)**florahart**.  
_Disclaimer:_ None of these characters or their settings belong to me.  
Title from [Kiss From A Rose](http://www.elyrics.net/read/s/seal-lyrics/kiss-from-a-rose-lyrics.html) by Seal.

 

Gaila's message consisted of her room number at Starfleet Medical, a time, and three undeniable words: "You owe me." And yeah, Jim does. Besides, his head's been a little too busy for sleeping since they got back to Earth, between finishing up and testing out of his remaining coursework, waiting to see what Command will do with him now that they've decided he gets to graduate, and trying not to dream of the _Enterprise_, too much. So he might as well stay up, no rest for the naughty and all that.

It turns out Gaila wants to sneak onto the roof, and Jim's role is two-legged transport. She has a blanket under her arm and a reprogrammed cardkey in her hand, and he balances her on his knee while she unlocks each access door. "After 1800 they won't let me sign out a wheel- or floatchair," she tells him as he carries her up the final flight of stairs. "I'm working on something to help me move on my own, but it's not ready yet."

"Maybe we could get you an old-fashioned substitute." As they step out under the clear night sky Jim can't keep from glancing at the stars; Gaila looks up too, her full mouth oddly still, lights below and above sparkling in her eyes. "Oil up some built cadets and give them a sedan chair on poles?"

Gaila smacks his shoulder, but her laugh's short and harsh, not her usual rounded giggles, and his shoulder tingles from her forceful thump. "Ha ha," she says coolly, "let's sit over there."

"Yes, ma'am." Half of command is knowing when to follow orders, after all. Gaila shakes out the blanket, and Jim sets her down and sits beside her. The spot's central enough on the roof for the low walls to recede, giving the visual effect that they're perched on a small flat plane beneath an overarching expanse of black-blue sky.

Memory and vertigo shiver down Jim's spine. For a moment he feels the Earth swing as if it could tip them off into a reverse spacejump, the space above him like they could throw their arms wide and soar. Gaila murmurs beside him, "Hello, stars," and he turns to her to say something funny, something easy, but her eyes are dark and clear like the sky. "I'm glad I'm back planetside," she says. "Before the Federation I lived on space stations. Even when I had access to windows, the stars didn't twinkle..." She looks up again. "When the _Farragut_ was destroyed, it was absolutely black in my chunk of Deck 8, and I kept thinking about the stars in planetary skies." Jim imagines her drifting in the dark, waiting for rescue or depressurization, and quietly flips his hand palm-up. "I saw a couple of sparkles, but that was probably just nerves firing."

She lays her hand in his, so he asks, "Going back up there?" Casually, making no big deal either way. If she starts crying, he'll--

"Yes!" Gaila actually glares, squeezing his hand so sharply it hurts. "You bet your sweet ass, Jim Kirk." She does love that idiom. "As soon as I can walk again I'm finishing my coursework and getting posted."

Eyes glinting, she looks absolutely fierce, and he doesn't doubt her. "I don't think I've ever seen you pissed off before." Jim says, grinning at her bright anger. "I mean, there was our last date, but then you looked more like incredulous."

Gaila opens her mouth, rolls her eyes, and... _there's_ that bubbly giggle he's used to. "You're horrible." Her smile blooms sweet and warm, and hey, Jim didn't come up here expecting to get laid, but he wouldn't mind either. "And you didn't see me when I realized how you got those _Kobayashi Maru_ codes." Jim lifts his free hand, pulling together a new improved explanation that's even bullshit-free, but Gaila waves it off. "You're lucky, though, that's not why we're up here tonight."

"So, what _are_ we up to? Besides stargazing." The sky spins above them, slow and vast, little pieces of that infinity reflecting in Gaila's eyes.

Jim's never seen her serious like this. The incongruity makes him twitch, but he remembers the narrow disbelieving glances of the _Enterprise_ crew when he sat in the Captain's chair, the empty space at his back when even Bones doubted him. He remembers the answers in the quiet dark of the older Spock's eyes, and the only story Gaila's told him about her past, her whispers in the dark about killing the man who tried to recapture her. That was just a few weeks ago, but since then Jim has killed as well, and seen death as huge as the sky above them, so he looks into her light-flecked eyes and gives her a few minutes.

He hasn't really gotten bored yet, not least because she still smells so damn good and she wears the hospital nightgown like lingerie, when she takes a breath and says quietly, "The _Farragut_ is gone." That brings up the memorial services, table after table of photos and placards and incense sticks, and Jim thinks he hides the wince until her grip tightens gently. "Do you know how many Starfleet personnel survived the Battle of Vulcan?"

Jim knows. "628." He doesn't let his eyes drop from hers.

"Only 145 who weren't on the _Enterprise_." Gaila touches her chest above her breasts. "Only three from the _Farragut_. Including me."

Jim nods uneasily, and doesn't tug his hand away, yet. Gaila's never bothered with survivor's guilt before, and he's pretty sure she's too practical to ask him how he feels or some such bullshit, so he waits a little longer to see where this is headed.

"All these people," Gaila murmurs, her voice as cool as water, "vanished into the dark like stars gone out." Jim nods, thinking about escape routes, about getting her back to her room, about bars where no one knows him. "Captain Garrovick, Captain Vasan, 78 percent of our graduating class." But she's not crying, either, and everything she says is just fact. "People we served with, people we studied with, people we fucked." Besides, she still smells good. "And Vulcan. A whole planet, all its people, its twinkling sky. All of that, gone." She just looks at him with those bottomless eyes.

Jim makes up his mind. He mutters, "Come here," and Gaila pushes herself as much closer as her weakened legs will let her; he wraps his arm around her and buries his face in her curly hair. He's had Gaila in his arms a bunch of times, but not like this before, hip against clothed hip, her arms tight and steady across his back. He thinks about kissing her, about how the scent of her hair makes his mouth water, but right now he just breathes and holds on.

It isn't that long until the line of Gaila's back firms under Jim's hand; she tilts her face up, skimming her plush mouth invitingly over his cheek, and as hot as it always is to kiss her it's even more of a relief. It's light and closed-mouthed, and she pulls back pretty soon to murmur, "We're not dead." Her breath's warm on his cheek, voice still calm and cool, and he remembers empty air beneath him as he dangled by his fingertips, two black holes dragging at the Enterprise, darkness welling behind his eyes each time crazy green fingers fastened around his throat. "_We're not dead_," this time in smoke-soft Orion Prime, and he remembers the way his heart pounded, blood surging under his skin and all his nerves singing with overload, so much like sex. He pushes the memories back with the silky feel of her cheek, thumbs her tender bottom lip as he turns her face towards his, and kisses her again.

She growls kittenishly into him, her arms tightening around his ribs, and this one's a real kiss, softly parted lips, the warmth of her mouth, the slide of tongue. She giggles just like she did five weeks ago, and that's the Gaila he knows, who should be kissing and laughing instead of moping. So when she pulls back _again_ Jim looks at her through his lashes, a pose she's always liked, flicks his tongue suggestively across his upper lip, and politely replies in Orion Prime, "_We're alive, we should celebrate_."

Gaila's grin shines, the thin city light tinting her skin green-gold. "_I knew you would understand. Share sex with me?_"

_That's_ a coping method Jim can work with. "_Yes, thank you!_" He shrugs off his jacket, leaning in to start kissing for real.

Gaila stops him with a hand on his chest, and he has a flash of suspicion that she's actually been brainwashed by some cockteasing conspiracy or something, especially because this was always her 'come hither' smile before. "_Do you know why we do this?_"

Seriously, she of all people needs a reason? "_To affirm our continuing presence?_" he replies, winging the vocabulary a bit. "_Because we can?_"

She laughs and kisses him, so Jim guesses that's a valid answer. "I had to make sure you understand," she says in Standard, pushing one hand across his chest, thumbing his nipple on her way around his ribs. "It's important."

As long as they don't stop... "Sure, sure, I get it," Jim mutters against her mouth, sliding one hand under her sleek thigh, helping her onto his lap. He reaches for her free hand, tangling their fingers briefly before stroking up her soft-skinned arm and down her curves, side and hip and sweetly rounded ass.

"You usually do," Gaila murmurs in his ear, then curls her tongue against it to make him shake and laugh. "Most people just don't understand mourning sex. I would've thought Terrans would, when there are several cultures here that utilize sexual rituals..." She sighs the 'Humans are So Strange' sigh he's heard from everyone from Andorians to Vulcans, but even if she weren't exhaling it softly over his damp ear, pressing her breasts up against his chest, he wouldn't mind.

Besides, Jim obviously needs to step up his efforts at distraction. "But if we wait till morning," he says, dragging his fingertips up the furrow of her spine so she shivers happily, "it'll be harder to get you back to your room without anyone noticing. I mean, of course I can manage it, but--"

Gaila pulls back, one hand tucked behind his neck, tilting her head a little as she looks at him. "That is so weird," she says, and giggles, so completely messing with him. He's trying to unravel precisely how when she enlightens him with, "I said '_mourning_,' you know, grief and celebration. Because we can, in honor of everyone who can't anymore."

"Huh." Jim's shiver now has nothing to do with the breeze or Gaila's warmth. He almost says how that's just a little morbid, but starlight glimmers in her eyes, the endless sky hangs over them, and maybe he sees what she means. So instead he asks, "Sexual rituals?" as he winds his fingers into her curls. "We've got those?"

"Maybe you should learn more about your own planet." Gaila gives him a wicked smile as she pulls his shirt up, upper teeth denting her lip just enough to show off its luscious tenderness.

Jim pulls his hands up through her hair, fingertips skimming her scalp as she tips her head back, and there they go, this is sex and sex isn't morbid. "I'll get right on that, after you get on me," he says as she tugs his shirt over his head, and she laughs brightly, pulling a condom out of her pocket as she drops her robe, shaking her head so her hair tumbles around her shoulders. "So, how do you want me?"

"Just like this, sitting up." Kisses as punctuation give way to honest making out as Gaila unfastens Jim's pants with her long talented fingers and works them down his thighs. He groans under her touch and slides his hands under the thin crisp gown, over her warm velvety skin. There, at the crease of her hip, and _there_ at her nape, and she moans into his mouth.

Jim tugs off Gaila's gown, tucking their clothes under his leg so they don't blow away. As their arms wrap around each other, as he drags his fingers over her skin and finds all her favorite spots until she's shivering continuously against him, as she twists her fingers around him so perfectly he pants aloud, he realizes they've fucked enough times that they're getting to know each other's reactions. Usually during sex he anticipates possibilities with each lick and stroke and thrust, like a carnal kind of chess; there aren't that many people he's ever known like this. Bones, Carol, Gary...

That thought's a painful kick to the chest, breathlessness that has nothing to do with sex. Jim buries his face in Gaila's scented neck, and she pushes her fingertips through his hair and says, low and kitten-growly again, "Fuck me."

There she goes, surprising him, distracting him. "If you're sure," he drawls in her ear as he nibbles on it, because for them this is hardly any foreplay at all.

"Of course I'm sure." As she rolls the condom onto him she bites him low on his shoulder, just so, and he gasps a laugh, because she only bites with that particular force when she really is ready. They cooperatively pull her up, his hands on her waist, hers tight on his shoulders, and sit her down on his very-happy-indeed dick. "Ah, yeah," she moans, tossing her head back as Jim sucks along her collarbone, shuddering under the clutch of her body, the sumptuous fullness of her ass. She feels great, she feels familiar and all the better for it; her body twists warmly against his, their heartbeats pound counterpoint to the rhythm they're setting, and this is as awesome as ever.

But Jim's brain still won't shut off under this huge empty sky, and Gaila's throat is open and gorgeous with her head back like that, but he wants to drown his thoughts in her eyes. He hefts the familiar weight and beautiful curve of her breast, her nipple flesh-firm under his thumb, and when he curls down to roll it on his tongue she tenses and groans and grabs his head. "Mmm, Jim," she says, and for that moment that's it, just the two of them, fucking and alive.

Jim kisses the velvety skin over Gaila's breastbone, her collarbones, her throat, pressing his other hand low on her back to hold her more firmly against him. He aims for her mouth but she tips her chin away, so what the hell, he bites her gently under her ear, nothing that'll bruise. She tastes as good as ever, her own richly floral savor, and maybe it's more of an effort than usual to blank his mind of everything except Gaila on his senses and the roll and plunge of sex, but he does, kissing her skin as he buries his face in her redolent hair.

"Like that, yes, yes," Gaila murmurs, pushing her hand between them; he reaches too, because honestly, she knows he's not selfish like that, but she shrugs him off. "Squeeze me," she orders with a smile, so he does with both arms, tightly enough to feel her skin slide and breasts shift with each gasping breath, to feel her fingers between them, skimming his dick as he thrusts, pressing firmly on her clit.

She looks up again, staring up at the sky as she rocks into him, and he can only thrust shallowly but the way she quivers into her gathering orgasm, tight focused ripples around him, the way she cries out from her depths up to the sky, it's all enough and more than enough. Jim's already moaning in the back of his throat even before Gaila drops her mouth to his shoulder, hot on his skin, wraps both arms around his ribs, one hand wet on his back, squeezes deliberately on him and whispers, "Come on, come on."

"Fuck, _fuck_," Jim mutters, and just as he shudders and breaks she breathes words into his ear, something he doesn't catch because he's too busy coming in pulses of pleasure, and then not falling over during the boneless moment afterwards. Gaila shifts like she thinks she'll have to let go and brace herself, and there's no way he's letting her hold him up; it's just a couple of gasping moments until he's got his balance, his arms tight around her back, and when she giggles he laughs over her cheek into a nice deep after-sex kiss.

After all that, he remembers what she said, in Orion Prime again. "_We are made of dust and light_." She rests her head on his shoulder, her hair falling softly down his arm as they catch their breath in this upright cuddle. There've been other people who've leaned on him just like this, their hearts pounding against his, warm and sated and happy, people who are gone now. As Gaila breathes in his arms, Jim looks out into the star-flecked distance, seeing the official list of casualties scroll in his memory. As he paged through it recognition highlighted name after name, but somewhere in the 'H's he snagged on the realization that he just couldn't find everyone he's roomed with, hung out with, had sex with. He found that Gaila wasn't on the list, that Gary Mitchell was, and he found the gap, between Kingston and Kitalpha, where James T. Kirk would've been. Objectively, he knows there's a finite number of Starfleet's dead from the Battle of Vulcan, but Jim never found Xag or Zerippe, never reached the list's end.

Gaila kisses Jim's cheek slowly and softly, like she knows what he's thinking, so he asks, "You're all set for the evening? Usually you make me lose count."

"Mmph, that was lovely and you know it. I'm just a little tired." She feels tired, still boneless against him, and her last shiver wasn't sex; she's not coming out in goose-pimples, but her skin is doing this denser-tighter thing under his hands that feels like a reaction to cold.

"Not to sound like Bones," Jim says, shifting Gaila off his lap, "but you _are_ still in the hospital, if you noticed." When he's sure she won't tip over he lets go to hand over her clothes, and she pulls little white industrial panties from her robe's pocket.

She also pulls out a pack of disposable wipes, passing him a couple. "The boredom makes it difficult to forget." Gaila wrinkles her nose. "Most of the medical staff don't think I should read or calculate or find anything else to do besides rest, as if I can heal faster by lying around thinking about it."

"You know, you could've just told me you were bored and wanted to fuck, I'd've come by at Warp." Condom off and cleanup finished, Jim shoves the trash in his pocket and pulls up his pants again.

Gaila always smirks so sweetly. "I know, but I wanted to talk, too." She's still shivering as she ties on her robe, and as he pulls his shirt back on Jim hands her his jacket. "Thanks, will you be warm enough?"

"You heat me up, baby," he says with an absolutely necessary eyebrow waggle, and she laughs and shoves lightly at his chest. "What, you have more supplies in those pockets?"

"More would be fun, but not tonight. Just lie down." Actually, her hand trembles on his breastbone, and she's seriously drooping. Jim obliges, and Gaila tucks herself against his side, her head on his shoulder, her arm across his chest. A shift and a tug, and he gets her legs draped over his as well.

Flat on his back, all Jim can see are the stars dangling almost close enough to touch. "We should get you back to your room."

"Now you do sound like Doctor McCoy," Gaila says drowsily. "Kiss him for me."

Jim's laugh fades out into the air above them. "When he tries to hit me with a hypo, I'm telling him I'm following your orders."

But Gaila is already asleep, lax and warm beside Jim, so he drifts for a minute under that endless sky. It's vast and merciless, and it shines as beckoningly as ever, even with a lot of good people and an entire planet gone in its depths. Jim glances at Gaila sleeping, her lashes shadowed on her cheekbones, and thinks about her thinking of them all, of living a little more fully for everyone who can't.

They're still on the roof, Gaila pillowed on Jim's chest, when he opens his eyes to the pink and gold of sunrise.


End file.
